ABC News has been given a photograph that might make the difference between life in prison and a walk. For weeks, we have been discussing the case and the application of the Stand Your Ground law. As discussed earlier, I think the case was over-charged and I remain doubtful of a conviction. This picture will likely be the single most important piece of evidence in the case. It shows Zimmerman with significant blood on the back of his head — an image that supports accounts from the scene and will be used to corroborate Zimmerman’s account of a struggle with Trayvon Martin where he feared serious bodily injury. [UPDATE: Zimmerman granted bond].
Unlike the photos of Zimmerman at the police station, this photo was taken a few minutes after the fight. Zimmerman’s shaved head could prove Godsend for Zimmerman. Had he had longer hair, the injury would have not appeared so stark.
The photo shows both cuts and a contusion — injuries that would normally be defined as serious bodily injury by many courts in torts cases where head injuries are treated as inherently potentially serious. The original police report said that he was bleeding from the nose and head and that his clothes looked like he had been in a fight. Zimmerman claims that it was Martin who jumped him, punched him, and pounded his head on to the concrete sidewalk.
The prosecutors can still argue that they do not contest the fight but that Zimmerman started it. However, with this photo, the charge of second-degree murder appears even more excessive and undermines Special Prosecutor Angela Corey’s claim that she was not affected by the political pressure to charge Zimmerman. I can understand a manslaughter charge, even with the photo, but no reasonable prosecutor would consider the second-degree murder charge as based on this evidence. Corey clearly must have seen this photo and the reports before her charging of Zimmerman.
The photo should also assist Zimmerman in his efforts to get bail.
Zimmerman, 28, is still being held on charges of second-degree murder of Martin, 17. In my view, a denial of bail would be an abuse and unwarranted given the fact that Zimmerman cooperated at the scene and voluntarily turned himself in.
Source: ABC
Sling, thank you, what a relief!
Of course, I guess I could still be a fake idiot or a demi-diot or an idiot wannabe…the possibilities are endless!
I don’t think that real idiots stress about the possibility of their being an idiot.
Well, Sling, Gene H, and everybody else, here’s my REAL problem with this whole thing: Matt is calling me an idiot. I mean, what if he’s right? (This is actually possible, because we can’t assign a value of zero to any possibility here, and I did not even assign a value of zero to the possibility that George Zimmerman was truly innocent, remember? I said that it was possible the initial police report and the recorded call and the police video and the other 911 calls were all forgeries, so there could not be a zero chance of innocence. So “res ipsa loquitur,” and there cannot be a ZERO chance that I am an idiot.) What if I’m an idiot? And then there’s even MORE to worry about: since there are difficulties with the language of probability versus certainty on this thread, do you think it’s necessarily either probable or certain that I’m an idiot, and if so, is it possible for me to make myself look dumber, and if so, how?
This is getting to be too much for me! I wish I could put up one of those little bilious green faces with a grimace on it, and sweat pouring off the forehead.
Maybe I better shut up before somebody else starts thinking I’m dumb, huh?
ST,
That isn’t the first time Matt has had difficulty with the language of probability versus certainty on this thread.
Matt: “it’s called PHYSICS and PROBABILITY”
You are being inconsistent.
Probabilities are not facts. You lecture people about FACTS, and then you assert PROBABILITY.
If you accept probabilities, then you should consider the the strong probability that Zimmerman was a wingnut who followed a perfectly innocent person into the dark and then shot after he found that his stupidity had got him into a bad situation.
“Seller Offers Gun Range Targets Meant to Resemble Trayvon Martin”
The Huffington Post | By Gene Demby Posted: 05/11/2012 2:12 pm Updated: 05/11/2012 5:21 pm
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/05/11/trayvon-martin-gun-targets_n_1510080.html?icid=maing-grid7|main5|dl1|sec1_lnk3%26pLid%3D160284
Article:
A Florida entrepreneur said he had sold out of gun range targets depicting a faceless, hood-clad figure holding an iced tea and a bag of Skittles meant to look like Trayvon Martin.
“The response is overwhelming,” the seller told Orlando’s WKMG news team over e-mail. “I sold out in two days.” The station did not identify the seller, and said it found the ad on a popular firearms auctioning website.
A cached version of the GunBroker.com webpage belonging to a seller named “hillerarmco” from Virginia Beach, Va., shows the paper targets being sold in packs of 10 for $8.
The description of the product reads:
Everyone knows the story of Zimmerman and Martin. Obviously we support Zimmerman and believe he is innocent and that he shot a thug. Each target is printed on thick, high quality poster paper with a matte finish! The dimensions are 12″x18″ ( The same as Darkotic Zombie Targets) This is a Ten Pack of Targets.
A Twitter account with the same name has been discontinued. A Google search on “hillerarmco” shows a company called the Hiller Armament Company. The domain for Hillerarmco.com is no longer active.
Martin, an unarmed 17-year-old, was shot and killed by a neighborhood watch volunteer as he returned to his father’s girlfriend’s house after a trip to the convenience store. Martin was unarmed, but was carrying a bag of Skittles, a can of iced tea, and his wallet after he was shot by George Zimmerman, the watch volunteer. The shooting, and the local police’s handling of it, have become major news stories and sparked national conversations around racial profiling and gun laws.
In the aftermath of the shooting, protesters calling for Zimmerman’s arrest donned hoodies and waved Skittles at protests around the country.
According to WKMG, the seller said that that the “main motivation was to make money off the controversy.” The seller said that he was a supporter of Zimmerman who thinks “he is innocent and that he shot a thug.”
Mark O’Mara, Zimmerman’s attorney, told the news station that he felt the targets were offensive. “This is the highest level of disgust and the lowest level of civility,” O’Mara said. “It’s this type of hatred — that’s what this is, it’s hate-mongering — that’s going to make it more difficult to try this case.”
(end of article)
Malisha – You’re still an idiot, it’s called PHYSICS and PROBABILITY. Just shut up now before you make yourself look even dumber (if that’s possible).
On the contrary; I have focused attention on Trayvon’s state of mind.
Fair enough Tony, it obviously is a core concept in your scenario. I think criminalization is much closer to what black youth experience or tell each about than the kidnapping. If I may cite Henry Miller in this context:
In every statement there is a little error and the error gets bigger and bigger until the snake is scotched. I should check one of these days, if my memory is correct at all.But I better don’t download these version. Big red warning signs.
Of course I do appreciate Malisha’s alert to consider “TV fiction or fictionalized reality”, I once had the pleasure to meet an American prof over here, who even invited a colleagues for a weekend with presentations for us. One of his main points was the question, to what extend makes movie fiction people unable to judge reality correctly. So, I understand what you mean.
I have to meet a friend.
Matt, your defensiveness has crossed the line onto offensiveness.
YOU put the adjectives into the sentence, Matt:
“a 5’9″ 200 pound Hispanic man cannot OUTRUN a 6’2″ 150-160 pound Black *MAN*”
Are you trying to say a 5’9″ 200-pound man cannot outrun a 6’2″ 150-160 pound man?
First of all, you should run some studies — controlled studies, Your Royal Highness — on whether “a 5’9″ 200 pound Hispanic man can OUTRUN a 6’2” 150-160 pound Black *MAN* — and then do the math.
Oh, be sure to correct for a few variables in that study (and then replicate it), such as: length of the course, awareness before the event that each is being asked to run a certain course, visibility, distractions (such as a cell phone, a compulsion, a fear), quality of the shoes, training, familiarity with the venue and conditions, surface of the course to be run, and like that.
Second of all, the statement itself means nothing to the case itself, since Trayvon Martin (whom you identify probably as the Black *MAN*) had stopped trying to run away by the time Zimmerman found him the second time. So it was not a case of Martin trying to run and Zimmerman being unable to catch up, and the issue is irrelevant. When Zimmerman told the cops that Martin ran away, that was obviously before the time when they were together on the grass outside the window of one of the 911 witnesses.
Anyway, we’re not totally sure, are we, that Martin’s only option was to run. Perhaps he had another option called, colloquially, “stand your ground.”
LeejCarrol and Malisha – “Seems racist to me, because he is Black, he can outrun someone else?”
You both are idiots. Martin couldn’t be outrun by Zimmerman because of age and weight, not because he’s black you morons! There you both go again, attacking my character because you can’t talk about anything relevant and back it up with FACTS. Well done on showing the ignorance of a lot of people.
Sling Trebuchet, the court records concerning his 2005 resistance against police officer with (first) or without (after) force are not closed, I am told. I’ll get the records.
Patrik Jonsson, of the Christian Science Monitor, writes this:
Jonsson hasn’t responded to my email. But if this statement is correct, than it was Judge Miller’s decision that he takes an anger management course. The contract for the program he had to sign will tell us. His decisions are recorded.
****************************************
It seems my suspicion concerning Zimmerman’s coaching of black kids/youth, if this could have been part of the PTD process, is not justified:
I am assuming that it wouldn’t have been a funded program.
@leander22: That’s why Tony’s scenario for me hits home much closer to me. Admittedly he concentrates on Zimmerman’s mind and not Martin’s. That surely leaves out the fear component or what Trayvon felt.
On the contrary; I have focused attention on Trayvon’s state of mind. Specifically, that black teens in the USA have access to both history and the Internet, and as a result have a distinctly different mindset about racism against blacks than do whites.
Without sugar-coating it, by the time they are teens the majority of blacks have experienced racism both personally and vicariously, so much so that they tend to be on high alert for racism. They have seen and read of blacks lynched, beaten, dragged to death, burned alive, or simply shot and killed. In fiction, on TV, in movies based on real life, in real history and in real life on the Internet. For nearly all blacks in this country, racism feels real and prevalent.
While it is true that all of these evil things can happen to whites, very few whites going about their normal activites worry that such things might happen to them simply because they are white.
That is a statistically accurate perception of blacks based on history and the news. My sister is a sociologist; this shows up definitively on one study after another, as does the disparity of the perception of racism between whites and blacks, or the worry they might be targeted because of their skin color.
To take that general atmosphere to the specifics of the Trayvon Martin case; if I were a black teen today (with fair warning that I am not now and have never been a black teenager), walking alone at night with low visibility in an unfamiliar neighborhood and realized I was being slowly followed by somebody alone in a car that I had checked out and realized was not black like me, the uppermost concern in my mind would be “racist stalker that wants to hurt me.”
Under the circumstances, I think Trayvon would feel like prey. Specifically, I think this frame of mind explains why he left the roadway (or sidewalk by it) for the cover of the buildings. Like all of us, it probably occurred to him that a drive-by shooting would be a plausible way for a racist stalker to hurt him with virtually no risk to themselves; and a defense from such an attack would be putting some distance between himself and the road, by walking in-between the buildings. To me the most plausible explanation of Trayvon’s actions is an assumption by him that he was being targeted by a racist that saw an opportunity for mayhem.
If that were the case, it might even explain Trayvon putting his hand in his waistband (if that really happened and wasn’t just a Zimmerman lie to escalate the danger to get the police to respond more quickly and with more force). Trayvon’s thinking could have been that a racist attack would be less likely if Zimmerman thought he might be armed.
None of that is to accuse Zimmerman of racism, it says I think Zimmerman being some KKK or skin-head (look at the picture of Zimmerman’s head above) type racist was probably uppermost in Trayvon’s mind.
Leander, of course the Gacy and Dahmer incidents are old news, before Trayvon Martin was born, but have you watched TV and movies recently? Almost every FBI show, cop show, Law and Order, Criminal Minds, Special Victims Unit, blah blah blah blah etc etc ad nauseam has the:
“Kid is kidnapped and tortured and the good guys save him/her” and it’s down to the minute and they save the victim at the last instant of the show.
They drink coffee and talk to each other while walking briskly through the squad room, looking sideways at each other, as NOBODY TALKS. They make things that are not common into EVERYDAY occurrences. Kids see this stuff on a daily basis. It has made me wonder how anybody can trust anybody any more. It’s all OVER the place.
I only thought it was unfair to evaluate Trayvon Martin’s mind if that was in the nature of finding out why he might have “reacted wrong” or “overreacted” to the approach of Zimmerman. Of course, any kind of meditation or discussion on any of these topics is “fair” — I meant it only to say that there can ultimately be no apportionment of blame onto the victim by some combination of post-mortem mental examination or interpretation.
The Police Chief of course was doing that when he issued a statement shortly after the crime, saying he thought Trayvon Martin probably would have changed his behavior if he knew now…blah blah blah lie lie lie.
Trayvon Martin’s behavior was above reproach, that’s all I meant. Whatever motive he had for his behavior — of course we will never know — but whatever motive he had, surely the motive UNDER that motive was simple self-preservation.
…inverse begone.
I don’t think it’s fair to evaluate Martin’s mind for why he wouldn’t want a confrontation with a genuine official or a non-hostile stranger that night. His suspension from school is not relevant, PERIOD. If you are afraid you will be in trouble, but you have nothing incriminating on you (no baggie with traces of anything; no alcohol, no drugs, no contraband), any stop from any authority will be OK. Martin had NO REASON to fear real police that night
I appreciate your: if-I-were-17-years-old-series above. Ultimately it shows we all approach the case via identification. The time will come when DeeDee (actually a pro-Zimmerman blog on the right outed her name) will tell us what Trayvon Martin watched, felt and thought could be Zimmerman’s intention. I guess, that is about as close as we will be able to get.
There is a reason why I hesitate to embrace the kidnapping (Dahmer or Gracy – both events are not really recent, they happened before TM’s birth) associations in our context. Would that really be the first thing on his mind? It feels it brings in a slightly sensationalist component. But the Trayvon Martin shooting is much more an everyday event. Only very few people would know about it, hadn’t the parents fought for their right to know more about the precise circumstances of their son’s death and that the shooting goes to trial. That’s why Tony’s scenario for me hits home much closer to me. Admittedly he concentrates on Zimmerman’s mind and not Martin’s. That surely leaves out the fear component or what Trayvon felt.
I respect your huge experience in the domestic violence and child abuse field, and I do not doubt at all that there is corruption in the police, (politics? authoritarian mindset? following orders and regulations? money?). I am aware of more liberal and more authoritarian streams inside the police over here. Occasionally the policies and regulations mainly seem to have the aim of making money, we have one program targeting cyclist here in Cologne, it started around the university, that obviously only had one aim: making money. They targeted specific spots, where you can be 100% sure that while the light is still red, there will be no traffic, since traffic is stopped about 250 to 300 feet down the road by another red light. I am sure it was lucrative, but it surely wasn’t what it supposedly was about: educate people. I analyzed the statistics used in their presentations, they were enormously misleading. This is everyday live police authority, with the aim of making money. … the nice/funny aspect was how fast warning signs developed among cyclists.
Mass murder and these kind of kidnappings aren’t an everyday occurrence.
And if you think it is unfair to “evaluate” Trayvon Martin’s mind during these for him horrible minutes leading up to his dead, isn’t the kidnapping scenario putting something in his mind too?
DeeDee will tell us more about how Trayvon registered the encounter and what he associated with this strange man following him. This is all we will ever know. And he may even have tried to not show her his fears, evaluating his mind again. 😉
As others here, I am struggling with the use of the scream for one reason only, I don’t think it should be the core problem. Martin did nothing wrong, he was on his way home, it was Zimmerman that started the whole affair. How exactly was his day up to that point?
southernbelle gonna luv this 1 : http://globalgrind.com/news/travon-martin-george-zimmerman-case-looks-reverse-photos
!
tony c
and the president of the united states of america.
LeejCaroll, I keep having the fantasy that if a doctor “gave me six months to live,” I would become an educator! So far, missed my calling.
Malisha ((*_*))
I dont think I had ever heard the outcome re: the cops. Disgusting. Someone needs to give them a lesson.